Month: December 2011

Mesocycles . Seasonal Term training , ( Off season , Pre season , In season ) Mostly of 2 to 3 months .

Micro cycles. – ( Weekly programming for upcoming week ) very much used in In season .)

Phases for Per iodization.

Off Season (Prepatory Phase).

Pre Season.

In Season .

Transitional Phase.

1) Off Season – Active Rest .

General Preparation.

Higher Volume , Low Intensity.

Improved short term endurance work capacity.

Important component for an athelete as it develops the base for pre season training.

Will focus more on technique and form of exercise , gradually moving to hypertrophy , to start of Max Strength .

2) Pre Season – Pre season would have some special exercises which is related to specific sport. More functional to a sport and also depends on specific role of an individual in a sport. Eg – Game of football – Athlete playing in front would have different program me compare to a goal keeper .

It would be moderate in volume to low volume compare to moderate intensity to high intensity. The Goal for pre season would be to develop strength and power. ( Max Strength and Ply metric exercises.)

3) In Season – In Season the athlete will be focused more on the practice of his game.

a) Proper recovery and maintenance should be focused.

b) Volume of training would be very less but with good intensity .

c) There should be proper management between the sport and training to avoid overuse and injuries.

d) Focus more on speed , power and maintenance in this phase of training.

Micro cycle- Maintenance and restitution workloads or recovery days , daily training routines distributed into modules separated by recovery breaks and additional intra session relief breaks. It can be advantageous to subdivide assigned workloads into clusters separated by rest pauses.

Cycles would not be accurately per iodized as it depends upon the different sport and the duration , intensity and volume of competitive phase.

Every Sport will defer from each other in General Phase , Pre – Competition phase and In competition phase.

It is important to have the athlete at its peak in competition phase. Sports vary their competition like 2 to 3 months, 4 months or even 6 months. An elite athlete can have max 2 peaks in a season.

So it’s a responsibility of a strength and conditioning coach to train and manage individual for its peak .proper recovery strategies and sessions should be organized.

Planning for peak.

There is no specific schedule for the peak . And this is the test for strength and conditioning coach how he manages all factors for a proper program me . The program me will again vary from individual and role in sport.

Factors –

1) Training Status.

2) Injury Status.

3) Nutritional basic.

4) Stress from sport coach.

5) Competition scheduled.

FMS – Functional Movement Screening would be of great use to detect the training status , after the screening from physio is done for any past or recurring injury .

Competition stress would vary from individual, depending upon his.

1) Experience in sport ( a debutant and athlete playing his 100th game ).

2) Level of Sport- (school and national competition).

The training would be from low to moderate volume with high intensity which can be micro managed from day to day and week by week.

A Micro cycle can be designed with high intensity start for a week ending up with a low intensity and recovery strategies at end.

(However some sport may need good intensity at end while starting with moderate.)

A) The cycle considerations should be the same whether you plan on using a program me that is or is not linear within the time frame you have to prepare for competition.

B) Ensure that the athlete doesn’t looses the influence of off season training till the end of the season. For that incorporate some preparatory phase training during this phase.

C) Basic strength and conditioning requirements before a formal per iodization program me.

D) Conditions –

a) If athlete is very low in physical condition.

b) Extremely over weight.

c) No Background in resistance training.

A base program me of 6 to 8 weeks may be needed to provide suitable adaptive period to resistance exercise.

(The above program me is needed in any rarely case).

Key points –

a) Proper Assessment ( FMS )

b) Novice in poor conditioning more ( GP ) would be required.

c) Strong emphasis on correct technique with lower volume work.

d) More gradual increases in volume and intensity may be required for weaker.

All program me should be made according to long term fitness goals.

Beginners should learn proper exercises.

If the basic is flawed than progress is impaired, transfers to other performance activities are reduced, leading to injuries.

Good amount of time should be given to learn proper exercise technique.

Lower level of exercise in same motion can be introduced if form or exercise technique is not correct.

Eg – if an individual is not able to do a push up with proper technique, transfer him to bar push up , or bench push up or if very bad in form than even a wall push up is recommended.

Establishment of good exercise technique is very important for long term fitness goal.

Even in elite athletes with good load in exercises with proper technique cannot be perfect in every session as previous session due to stress in sports , Domes , at the same time focus should be given to technique rather than over load.

Age Adjustments.

The concepts are the same but attainable target goals, implementation and progression may differ.

Factors to be considered.

A) Physiological and psychological readiness should be considered as with any exercise program me.

B) Young athlete would need more general phase with high volume and low intensity.

C) While advanced athletes are ready for higher volume and intensity with more variations in execise.

D) A beginner needs very little variation to learn the basic skill of s sport and to raise the basic physiological variables such as strength , power and work capacity from their untrained levels.

Like with any training program, progression is the key so it is really important that you or the athletes you train perform exercises that are challenging but not difficult. Difficult exercises are ones that you simply cannot perform with good form due to a lack of either mobility or stability or in many cases a combination of both. If an athlete shows any dysfunction it is important that we correct this before introducing higher level strength and power work into their program. Adding strength to dysfunction is only putting the athlete at greater risk of injury somewhere down the track.

Once you have sufficient mobility and stability and can show symmetry in a functional movement screen and assessment then you can and should start to develop the strength base of the athlete. This allows for physical development to occur safely and effectively. From a solid strength base we can then start to develop speed and power. Our goal is to improve performance while reducing the risk of injury.

With all my new clients I start with a functional movement assessment to figure out if the athlete has any asymmetries. If I find any weak points, I will plan and integrate corrective exercise into their program to improve their mobility, static stability and then dynamic stability. Mobility is always addressed first because adequate stability cannot be present with reduced mobility.

Only once movement quality is good enough I start implementing strength training under increasing loads (progression). After sufficient strength and core stability has been achieved and only then do I start introducing higher level plyometrics and rotational power movements into the athletes program. Remember they get rotational power and plyometric work in their skills practice and matches so careful consideration needs to be placed on when and how you implement this stuff into their program.

Exercise Selection:

If you are training an athlete or group of players it is crucial that you choose exercises that will allow you to evaluate their movement quality with every repetition that they do. You need to also take into consideration what training age you or your athlete is (i.e. how long they have been in the sport and how much strength and conditioning they have done previously)

There are a few more things to consider. Where exactly are you in your calendar? Are you starting your pre season preparation or are you in season? Obviously in season and off season will have an effect on how much work you do off the field. If we are talking about youth athletes, they invariably play other sports so be mindful of the amount of work they are doing there too! Programming all of this stuff is the tricky part as there is NEVER a one size fits ALL program.

Below I have included a basic program design outline for athletes . This is also applicable to other ground based rotational sports. How this is implemented needs careful consideration. Remember there are skills sessions , so timing of when you do your work is critical to injury prevention and enhancing your performance in each training session. This takes careful planning and often readjusting. Remember no program is perfect, no athlete is perfect, and no coach is perfect. Do the work, evaluate what you have done and always look to improve the way you coach!